Page 11 of You're Not My Mate

She turned toward Rocco. “He didn’t ask for this, and you might find there are a lot of people who didn’t ask for this. Why not ask Agatha, and while you do it, be sure to have Boyan present. I’m sure he’d love the way you feel about … everything.” With that, she turned to Graham. “I wish you all the best.”

This time, she left the cages. She sensed the coming of the pack, and she didn’t want to be there. She wanted to be as far away from Rocco as possible.

Why did she have to hate and crave him with equal measure? It didn’t make any sense.

Chapter Four

“She’s pretty,” Graham said.

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Is she your mate?”

Rocco glared at him.

Graham raised his hands, and in doing so rattled the chains. “Sorry, I didn’t realize I was not supposed to talk or do anything.” Graham sighed. “Does this mean you’re going to kill me?”

“Killing you would be a kindness.”

Graham clicked his tongue. “I have a feeling some people would disagree.”

“How long have you been like this?” Rocco asked.

“I don’t know. I lost track of time. I lost track of a lot of things. It takes a lot out of you, being experimented on. Going through these changes you never thought you would ever experience. The full moon rising, feeling like it’s making your blood boil. Wanting steak so badly that you’re willing to eat it raw rather than throw it on the barbecue for a couple of minutes.” Graham smirked.

“I eat my steaks well done,” he said. Actually, he loved it when it was pretty much burnt to a crisp, but he knew some of the guys liked it when there was still juice pouring out.

He rubbed the back of his head, knowing the guys were approaching.

“You didn’t answer me before.”

“About what?” he asked, not wanting to listen to whatever this man was talking about.

“Your woman, she’s your mate, right?”

Rocco frowned. He didn’t trust any of the things Milton had created. This man had admitted to working with Milton, and as far as he was concerned, that was bad fucking news. Verybad news, because it meant Graham was aware of what he was studying, regardless of what he said.

“For a guy who only thought he was extending the life of dogs, you sure seem to think you know a lot about us,” he said, folding his arms across his chest.

“I’ve had no choice but to learn what was going on.” Graham shrugged.

“How many other packs have you come from?” Rocco asked.

“None.”

“I don’t believe that. You cannot know about mates or some of the shit you do, without having encountered packs.” He didn’t know how many packs worked like the Poison Wolves, if any. Each pack was unique to their circumstances.

He looked at Graham, knowing there was more to this guy. Elizabeth hadn’t been much help with anything. Milton had worked hard in keeping a lot of people out of the loop regarding his experiments. He was getting angrier by the second as he looked at the man before him.

“Look, I know you don’t believe me, and trust me, I wouldn’t believe me either, but it doesn’t change the fact that it is the truth.” Graham pressed a dirty hand to his chest. “I feel it in here. It’s how I know your pack is coming. It was how I was able to locate that damn rabbit.”

“Why now?” Rocco asked. “You’ve clearly been dealing with this for some time, and yet, you’re just now coming to figure shit out.”

“I don’t know what Milton gave me. I don’t know what he did to me. I do know it had nothing to do with extending the life of fucking dogs, and trust me, I freaked out when I learned that.”

“You expect me to believe you loved a dog?”

“Buster,” Graham said. “He was a German shepherd, and I had him for twelve years. He was everything to me, and yes, hehad chased off a couple of girlfriends, because he was a pain in the butt, but he was my dog, my best friend, and so what, I may have treated him like a son or a best friend, and not a dog, but he was my fur baby.”

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